Key Highlights
- Records from the Electoral Commission reveal that Ben Delo donated £1 million on April 17 and £3 million on April 30.
- These contributions accounted for 75% of the £5.33 million that Reform UK secured in donations, with no other single donation exceeding £200,000.
- This year, Delo has donated a total of £8 million, making him the second-largest donor after billionaire Christopher Harborne.
Ben Delo, a co-founder of BitMEX, has donated an additional £4 million to Reform UK, bringing his total contributions to Nigel Farage's party to £8 million for the year, as indicated by records from the Electoral Commission released on Thursday.
The contributions were made through two payments, one on April 17 and another on April 30, both of which were accepted the following day. Together, they constituted 75% of the £5.33 million that Reform received in donations during this period and were the largest individual donations to any political party in the UK for the quarter.
Reform UK outperformed Labour, which garnered £3.59 million in donations, although the Conservative Party reported a higher overall total. Notably, Christopher Harborne, a Tether investor based in Thailand who has contributed £15 million to Reform since the last election, did not donate to any party this time.
Since March, UK electoral regulations require donors to have been registered for at least 12 months to contribute more than £100,000 annually. An insider from Reform UK stated to The Guardian that the party is optimistic about retaining Delo's £4 million donation, suggesting he may have been registered longer than previously thought.
No Cryptocurrency Donations
All donations were made in cash, as the UK prohibited political contributions in cryptocurrency in March, making Reform the only major party that had accepted such donations prior to the ban. Neither Delo’s nor Harborne’s contributions were made in crypto.
Delo had previously pleaded guilty in 2022 to breaching the Bank Secrecy Act due to anti-money laundering failures at BitMEX, but he and his co-founders were pardoned by U.S. President Donald Trump in 2025. In an April article for the Telegraph, Delo described the case as "a regulatory failing that isn’t even a crime in the UK."
Currently, BitMEX is in the process of shutting down, with its owner, HDR Global Trading, announcing in July that the exchange, which Delo co-founded in 2014 and no longer manages, will cease operations on September 23 following a strategic review.
This donation comes at a time when Reform’s funding is under increased scrutiny. Recently, two aides to Farage, Dan Jukes and policy chief James Orr, resigned just before the party conference commenced, after Channel 4 broadcast footage of them attempting to secure funding of £32,500 for party polling from a fictitious U.S. company controlled by undercover journalists.
Farage defended the party, asserting that Reform had not accepted any illegal funds, attributing the actions of the two men to "loose pub talk" and initiating an internal investigation. The Electoral Commission confirmed it is in communication with the Metropolitan Police, though no inquiry has been launched yet. Additionally, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards is considering whether Farage should have disclosed Harborne's £5 million personal donation.